Amoskeag Northern - Conrail Portland (PRO&C) Line Engineering Thread

[peteski]

Concord Car Shops? If so, no he isn't. Stopped doing decals and custom painting a while back.

Yeah, that was it. Too bad - those decals were nice!. Thanks for the info.

[Ian MacMillan]

No problem. Most of the decal artwork went to Jim at Highball Decals in Madison, NH

www.mgdecals.com

I've been trying to get Jim to do the New England Southern nose herald for hood units for years that CCS had. He recently did our SW1500 which has a small herald on the cab, so maybe I can get him to blow it up a tad.

[DKS]

Just popped in to answer a PM and poke around a bit, only to see something quite remarkable. Ian, that map was quite the surprise--just scroll left a bit and you'd hit a special place for me, a cabin where I'd lived 1/4 to 1/3 out of every year for well over half my life. So the area is as familiar to me as home. We called our little slice of heaven "Birch Knoll" because of the plethora of white birch on the property. (photos here)



I have to ask, though, is that Conrail alignment for real? Because as much time as I'd spent in the area (from 1959 onward), I'd never noticed any signs of an alignment along Route 25 near Ossipee.

Also, I have an uneasy feeling about how much track you have planned for your blob. I recall a similar situation with your last basement empire. I'm willing to tinker up some sketches if you like...

[Ian MacMillan]

Welcome back Dave!  I remember seeing some photos you had in an album online from there years ago.

The alignment is real, but Conrail. No. Were rails ever on it?  Not this part.  Route 25 in that section, between Meredith and Ossipee is on the surveyed alignment for the Portland, Rutland, Oswego and Chicago Railroad chartered in 1868. The section that I am modeling never got past the survey phase. You can read about it here:
http://amoskeagnorthern.com/portlandv1/index.php/about-the-layout/layout-at-a-glance

The blob is completley fluid so poke away at it. Only constraint is that it has to have a min aisle width of 32". I'm thinking more of using the 1997 tracks, which are the ones that I overlayed on the gmaps photo.

Here are the layout dimensions

Short upper wall: 28' long
Right wall: 11' long
Long bottom wall: 34' long

[DKS]

[davefoxx]

As usual, DKS, well played.  I like it. 

DFF

[Ian MacMillan]

Perfect. I have this idea in my head and then DKS comes along and is like take a seat why I skool you.

The NHN interchange is reverse of how envisioned but it actually works better this way as I can have ski trains come down from Conway. I'll just have aggregate trains come from Colemans pit in Madison and have staged hopers from Ossipee.

[peteski]

Ian,
sounds to me like you should include a scale model of DKS' family cabin on your layout. 

[Chris333]

DKS' family cabin...  I wonder how his new cabin is coming along?

[DKS]

I wonder how his new cabin is coming along?

Still just a sketch. Everything takes 10X longer than anticipated... (No one is surprised, I'm sure.)

[Ian MacMillan]

Got a chance to run down to HD today and pick up some materials for the layout and took a break from working on the office to work on the layout. I printed out sections of the 1:1 plan that DKS provided and taped them up to cut the 5.5mm base for the layout. I then glued down the 2" foam for the main line, and the 1" foam for where the paper mill is going to be. I ordered some track so that I can begin working on that as well to hopefully get all the mill trackage up and running first.

[Pomperaugrr]

Got a chance to run down to HD today and pick up some materials for the layout and took a break from working on the office to work on the layout. I printed out sections of the 1:1 plan that DKS provided and taped them up to cut the 5.5mm base for the layout. I then glued down the 2" foam for the main line, and the 1" foam for where the paper mill is going to be. I ordered some track so that I can begin working on that as well to hopefully get all the mill trackage up and running first.

That is going to be a fun area to switch while you are building the rest of the layout.

Awesome progress!

Eric

[Ian MacMillan]

Thats what I am hoping. Idea is to have the mill trackage up and running while I work on the rest of the layout so I can have something to tinker with and keep me from going crazy. I was able to solder up most of the trackage today, but I am shy a few turnouts to get it all glued down.

[Ian MacMillan]

Thanks to Atty. Foxx I now only need a few more turnouts to get this banged out. This bit of downtime today did allow me to do some more of the mill research and gather some photos. I need to head up sometime this spring and get some up close photos of my own. I may also have by buddy bring me up in his plane to get some overhead shots. Most of these I pulled from the web, unknown photographers unfortunately.

For the newer part of the mill I am going to have to pick up a few more of the Walthers HO corn storage buildings to use for the walls.


New Hampshire Public Radio


NH Union Leader



John Tully - Wall St. Journal



Berlin Mills 731 on down grade into the mill.


Berlin MIlls 741 at the yard along the river.

[conrailthomas519]

Ian, I'm not sure on this but I think I recall somebody is going to release a sw1 if I'm remembering it correctly.